Egyptian investment officials have held a flurry of meetings with UAE based companies and business leaders this week, part of an intensifying push to attract Emirati capital into the Egyptian market. Mohamed Awad, chief executive of the General Authority for Investment and Free Zones, met with Khalid Jassim Mohammed Bin Kalban, vice chairman and chief executive of Dubai Investments, to discuss the company’s plans to expand its footprint across Egypt.
During their discussion, Awad emphasized the value of drawing on Dubai Investments’ extensive experience developing large scale projects, planned cities, and industrial zones, suggesting Egyptian officials see the Emirati firm’s expertise as directly applicable to ongoing domestic development priorities. He reaffirmed the investment authority’s commitment to providing investors with comprehensive support and facilitation, while coordinating with relevant government bodies to advance previously explored investment opportunities toward more concrete implementation stages.
Following the meeting, Bin Kalban conducted a field visit to Dubai Investments Park, reviewing the development model the company has applied there and exploring how similar approaches might translate to the Egyptian market. The Dubai Investments executive expressed clear interest in strengthening the company’s presence in Egypt and capitalizing on the investment opportunities available across the country’s expanding development landscape.
This meeting formed just one part of a broader pattern of Egyptian outreach to UAE investors this week. GAFI also formed a dedicated task force specifically to monitor UAE investments and address any challenges facing Emirati companies operating in Egypt, meeting separately with the Secretary General of the UAE Investors Council Abroad to review Egypt’s investment climate and the incentives available to encourage continued Emirati investment and expansion.
Separately, GAFI’s chief executive met with the head of Dubai Chambers to discuss enhancing economic and investment cooperation between the two countries, part of a coordinated effort to strengthen ties between the Egyptian and Emirati business communities more broadly. That meeting reflected the multi-pronged approach Egyptian officials have adopted, engaging simultaneously with individual major investors, industry associations, and chamber of commerce networks across the UAE.
Egyptian officials have also engaged directly with UAE banking institutions as part of this broader investment push, with GAFI’s chief executive participating in a roundtable organized by Emirates NBD at its Dubai headquarters, bringing together bank clients interested in Egyptian investment opportunities alongside companies already operating in the country. That session built on a memorandum of understanding signed between GAFI and Emirates NBD late last year, aimed at increasing foreign direct investment in Egypt while providing banking and financing solutions specifically tailored to interested investors.
This intensified UAE outreach comes as Egypt continues pursuing an ambitious broader strategy of expanding public free zones to boost export capacity, with officials targeting one hundred forty billion dollars in exports by 2030. Egyptian officials have described near full occupancy rates across existing free zones as clear evidence of strong demand for export focused industrial platforms, providing additional justification for the current wave of investor engagement across multiple Gulf partnerships.
As these various meetings and initiatives continue unfolding throughout September, Egyptian investment officials will be watching closely to see how many of these engagement efforts translate into concrete new investment commitments from UAE based companies and financial institutions. For a government pursuing ambitious export and foreign investment targets, this sustained push toward deeper economic ties with Gulf partners represents an important complement to Egypt’s broader efforts to diversify its sources of foreign capital and strengthen its position as a regional investment destination.
